A Boost from Boomer!

A lot of waves are seasonal, meaning they only operate during certain times of the year. Bummer – we know!

What can flowboarders do with all their spare time when their wave is closed for months at a time?

Well, as many of you know, flowboarding was born from various board sports, giving birth to its own hybrid board, so to speak. Chances are that flowboarders in the community already participate in or are totally willing to try different (but similar!) board sports when they are not shredding on a FlowRider®.

Another way we encourage our community to pass the time (and, uh, stay out of trouble!) is by sharing their flow with us! Create content, send it in and let’s share it with the flow world. Simply e-mail submissions to Adam@FlowRider.com and tag @flowboarders in your social postings.

To get this started, we are happy to share a part of a recent email from an avid rider and positive member of the Flow Tribe (@FlowCiety):

“Here is the content I wrote the other day. Peruse it, and if you like it, feel free to post it. I enjoy the creativity in writing and expressing personality with flow – so whether it’s used or not, doesn’t really matter to me! Thanks for reading, brotha.”

The e-mail came from a rider in Arizona, Boomer Mueller. Boomer is a core member from the FlowCiety and is subject to a seasonal home wave. He and his crew recently experienced their last session of the season; we teamed up on that as well and shared some action from on and off the wave there.

Boomer wants to give flowboarders around the world a boost as they head into the next season. Let’s call it a Boomer Boost! Whether you are riding for fun or preparing for a FLOW Tour competition, or flowboarding is just a random activity for you, take notes!

3 Barriers in Your Riding and How to Guarantee Your Next Breakthrough in Flow!

There are a few inevitable (and pesky) barriers that block progression. It’s funny because everything I’m about to share with you was affecting my riding long before I could identify what the heck I was doing wrong.

If you are an advanced rider, working on these could immediately open a new door in your riding and bag of tricks. If you’re a beginner or novice rider, becoming aware of these barriers now will let you blast through them surge you to new levels fast.

Once I became familiar with these barriers, I began challenging my riding, my mind, and encountered breakthroughs in style. Shockingly, I began landing tricks I never before believed I could land. Let’s get into the 3 barriers and how to blast through them:

Discouragement with tricks: You really want that dang elusive kick flip. Landing it is one thing, but being consistent is another. It may take you 100 attempts before you land it again. Woven in those 100 attempts will inevitably be a lot of frustration, perhaps a broken toe or two, or maybe even the thought of quitting the sport (but not really).

Flowboarders tip: Body momentum and muscle memory is key. Repetition on and off the wave will bring consistently to your game. (i.e.)

2. No one is challenging you: Whether you are the best rider at your home wave, the only rider at your wave, novice, or somewhere in the middle. If there is no challenge, you will not reach your full potential.

3. Lack of experimentation: Do you drop in and repeat the same run over and over? Do you throw the same order of tricks? Do you use the full wave while riding? We are creatures of habit, so it’s a normal thing to put down runs that feel the same (because it’s comfortable). Lack of experimentation is the fastest way to experience a plateau of growth in your riding.

Flowboarders tip: Try to learn something new every day or session.

How to blast through these barriers:

Discouragement with tricks: An easy thing that we do on the wave when tension is building behind the same trick is “Break up energy.” It is easy to get caught in the cyclone of doom – you drop in, throw the trick, fall, drop in, throw the trick, fall, and repeat until somehow the two hour session is gone and you’re exhausted and pissed. When you feel yourself getting sucked into this, simply “Break the Energy.”

Sidenote: Never leave the wave mad. We’ll dive in deeper on why if Flowboarders invites us for another guest blog post… 😉

Stop and take 10 slow deep breaths (it doesn’t matter if you’re next turn is skipped) and put together some easy lines with tricks that you know you can land. This will chill your mind out from being blown on that new trick. Once you’re cooled down and no longer want to throw your board into next week, you may continue to attempt that trick again. You just broke up the energy.

No one is challenging you: One of my favorite things that we do at our wave is challenge each other and pass off a trophy each time someone wins the challenge. It’s called, “The Carrot Challenge.” It started out as a joke, “whoever lands this trick, gets a carrot!” We all took turns throwing a trick we weren’t comfortable with, or something creative that had a little finesse. Here’s a hint: it’s kinda like playing F.L.O.W. but with one trick and winner gets to rock the trophy until next session. Oh, our carrot is a black fossil now – we’ve had it for months.

Are you questioning what you just read? We did too… so let us clarify. “‘twas once upon a time a carrot” was the response I got when following up on this topic with Boomer. He also sent me this photo. Basically, it was a rotten carrot, which resembled a trophy when a rider from their tribe would land a unique first trick. As time went on, it became a challenge. Makes more sense, I can see how that may give you a boost!

Click to enlarge

Here’s a bonus on how to be challenged:Watch a rider that can do what you can’t yet do, and copy them until you can do what they do!

Lack of experimentation: This is a sneaky gremlin that will endlessly poke holes in your riding if you let it. Good news is, it’s simple to fix. It closely ties with challenging yourself, but is its own category because it requires you to be creatively disciplined. The ideal rider in most action sports has a collection of tricks, but endless creativity.

You don’t always need to hop on the wave and bang out tricks while staying in one spot. Sometimes your biggest breakthroughs come from simply maneuvering the wave. If you watch the pros, they have an elegant way of navigating the wave in between – and while – throwing their tricks. It appears as if they are writing in cursive with their boards across the wave.

Tricks are important, but style is king.

So try different maneuvers on the wave. Drop in differently. Spend time riding switch – we have really found that riding switch for a dedicated 10 minutes each session radically helps with smoothness and versatility on the wave.

Best thing to remember, play just outside of your comfort zone because that is where progression is born.